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Chamber Music Institute Faculty

Core Faculty: Artists-in-Residence at the College of the Holy Cross

Jan Müller-Szeraws,
Cello, Artistic Director

Cellist and Artist-in-Residence at the College of the Holy Cross Jan Müller-Szeraws has an active career as a soloist, chamber musician and teacher. Solo performances have included engagements with the New England Philharmonic, Concord Orchestra, Boston Landmarks Orchestra, Moscow Symphony Orchestra, Orquesta Sinfónica de Concepción, Orquesta de la Universidad de Santiago de Chile and Orquesta Sinfónica de Chile with repertoire ranging from concertos from the traditional repertoire such as Haydn, Dvorak, Schumann, Tchaikovsky, Shostakovich to contemporary composers Chou Wen Chung, Gunther Schuller, Bernard Hoffer and John Harbison.

Recent projects have been the release of "Anusvara", a disc with music by Shirish Korde for cello, tabla and carnatic soprano, the premiere of "Mutations" for solo cello and computer by Chris Arrell, the premiere and recording of "Suite for Solo Cello" by Thomas Oboe Lee as well as a disc with sonatas by Brahms and Chopin with pianist Adam Golka for Hammond Performing Arts. He has been guest professor at the Universidad Católica de Chile, a guest with the Israeli Chamber Project as well as guest principal cellist for the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra in Germany. He is member of contemporary music ensemble Boston Musica Viva and Boston/Andover based ensemble Mistral.

Also on the faculty at Phillips Academy Andover, he is a frequent guest artist at many festivals and is founder and Artistic Director of the Chamber Music Institute at Holy Cross, an intensive summer program for talented high-school and college students. Müller-Szeraws studied at the Musikhochschule Freiburg and holds degrees from Boston University. He plays a cello by David Tecchler, on loan from the Saul and Naomi Cohen Foundation.

Adam Golka,
Piano

Born in Texas to a family of Polish musicians, pianist Adam Golka has won widespread critical and popular acclaim with his “brilliant technique and real emotional depth” (The Washington Post). He has garnered international prizes including the 2008 Gilmore Young Artist Award, first prize in the 2003 China Shanghai International Piano Competition and the 2009 Max I. Allen Classical Fellowship Award of the American Pianists Association.

In the United States, Golka has appeared as a soloist with many orchestras, including the Atlanta, Houston, Dallas, Indianapolis, Milwaukee, Phoenix, San Diego, Fort Worth, Syracuse, Pensacola, Lansing, Knoxville, Ann Arbor, Albany, Omaha, South Dakota, and Grand Rapids symphonies, as well as with the New York Youth Symphony at Carnegie Hall’s Isaac Stern Auditorium. Internationally, he has appeared with the BBC Scottish Symphony, National Arts Centre Orchestra, Sinfonia Varsovia, Warsaw Philharmonic, Shanghai Philharmonic, and the Teresa Carreño Youth Orchestra of Venezuela, among others.

Golka’s solo performances have taken him to Concertgebouw’s Kleine Zaal, Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, Musashino Civic Cultural Hall in Tokyo, Mostly Mozart Festival, Gilmore Keyboard Festival, Ravinia Festival, New York City International Keyboard Festival at Mannes, Newport Music Festival, and the Duszniki Chopin Festival. His chamber music appearances have included prestigious festivals such as Marlboro, Caramoor, and Music@Menlo.

Adam began piano studies with his mother, pianist Anna Golka, and continued as a teenager with Dariusz Pawlas of Rice University. He holds Artist Diplomas from Texas Christian University and the Peabody Conservatory, where studied with José Feghali and Leon Fleisher, respectively. Adam has continued his development in lessons with Mitsuko Uchida, Richard Goode, Murray Perahia, and András Schiff, at whose invitationAdam will participate in a series of solo recitals in New York, Berlin, and Zurich in the 2014-2015 season.

Also in the 2014-2015 season, Adam will also be performing with Vancouver, San Diego, Richmond, Billings, Evansville, and Brevard symphonies, as well as solo recitals for the Van Cliburn Foundation and at Alice Tully Hall in New York. Adam's début recording, featuring the Sonata Opus 1 of Brahms and the Hammerklavier Sonata of Beethoven, was released in August 2015 by First Hand Records.

Guest Faculty:

Itamar Zorman
Violin

The recipient of an Avery Fisher Career Grant and a Borletti-Buitoni Trust award, Itamar Zorman was also joint winner of the 2011 International Tchaikovsky Competition. Other competition successes include first prize at the 2010 International Violin Competition of Freiburg and the Juilliard Berg Concerto Competition in April 2010.
As a soloist, Itamar Zorman has appeared with, among others, the American Symphony Orchestra in Carnegie Hall, Het Gelders Orkest in Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, the Tokyo Symphony in Japan’s Suntory Hall, as well as the Jerusalem Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, Haifa Symphony, Polish Radio Chamber Orchestra, Südwestdeutsches Kammerorchester Pforzheim, Philharmonie Baden Baden, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, and the Russian State Symphony Orchestra “Novaya Rossiya. In November 2014 he made his Italian debut at the Teatro Massimo in Palermo playing the Beethoven concerto with Daniel Oren, and in January 2015, his Korean debut with the KBS symphony Orchestra and Yoel Levi.

The 2015-16 season includes Itamar Zorman’s debut with the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse conducted by Joseph Swensen, a tour of Brazil with the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra and Frédéric Chaslin and concerto appearances in Italy at the Mito Settembre Musica Festival in Turin and Teatro Filarmonico di Verona with the Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra and Gintaras Rinkevicius. Other concerto appearances include the Santa Fe Symphony and Pennsylvania Center Orchestras in the USA, the Pan Asia Symphony in Hong Kong, the Vojvodina Symphony Orchestra in Serbia and the Israeli Kibbutz Orchestra. In January 2016, at the invitation of Mitsuko Uchida, he lead the Mahler Chamber Orchestra on a European tour of Mozart concerti. A regular at the Marlboro Music Festival, Itamar Zorman has also appeared at the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival, the Verbier Festival, the Louvre recital series in Paris, the Kronberg Academy Festival and the Copenhagen Summer Festival. In November 2014, he gave his Carnegie Hall recital debut, as part of the ‘Distinctive Debuts’ series in Weill Recital Hall. Itamar Zorman has also recently given recitals in the Laeiszhalle Hamburg, the HR-Sendesaal Frankfurt and the Kolarac Hall in Belgrade.

His first solo CD recording, entitled ‘Portrait’, and featuring works by Messiaen, Schubert, Chausson, Hindemith and Brahms was released in Europe in August 2014 and the US in February 2015) by Profil - Editions Günther Hänssler.

As a chamber musician, Zorman has appeared at the Lincoln Center, Zankel and Weill Recital Halls in Carnegie Hall, and at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. He is a founding member of the Israeli Chamber Project, and a member of the Lysander Piano Trio, with which he won the 2012 Concert Artists Guild Competition, the Grand Prize in the 2011 Coleman Chamber Music Competition, 1st prize in the 2011 Arriaga Competition, and a bronze medal in the 2010 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.

Itamar Zorman is a recipient of scholarships from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation, and has taken part in numerous master classes around the world, working with Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zuckerman, Shlomo Mintz, Ida Handel and Ivry

Born in Tel-Aviv in 1985 to a family of musicians, Itamar Zorman began his violin studies at the age of six with Saly Bockel at the Israeli Conservatory of Music in Tel-Aviv. He graduated in 2003 and continued his studies with Professor David Chen and Nava Milo. He received his Bachelor of Music from the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance as a student of Hagai Shaham. He received his Master's of Music from The Juilliard School in 2009, where he studied with Robert Mann and Sylvia Rosenberg, and received an Artist Diploma from Manhattan School of Music in 2010, and an Artist Diploma from Julliard in 2012, studying with Ms. Rosenberg. He later Continued his studies with Christian Tetzlaff and Mauricio Fuks at The Kronberg Academy.

Itamar Zorman plays on a 1734 Guarneri Del Jesù from the collection of Yehuda Zisapel.

Markus Placci
Violin

Praised for having “a magnificent personality, a superb energy, a total command and an extremely convincing taste” (La Libre Belgique), young Italian violinist Markus Placci is enjoying a growing international reputation that has already brought him solo appearances throughout Europe and the United States in renowned venues such as the Great Philharmonic Hall (Shostakovich Hall) and the Glinka Philarmonic Hall in St. Petersburg (Russia), the Kursaal in Baden-Baden, the Teatro Monumental in Madrid, the Auditori in Barcelona, the Teatro Comunale and Mozart Hall in Bologna, the Teatro Dal Verme in Milan, the Kennedy Center in Washington, Sanders Theater in Boston, and the Richardson Auditorium in Princeton.

Winner of the prestigious “XXVI Vittorio Veneto Competition” on a unanimous vote of the Jury presided by Maestro Bruno Giuranna, Mr. Placci is also the recipient of numerous other international awards and prizes such as the “Brahms Preis” and “Baden-Baden Philarmonie Foundation-Carl Flesch Preis” in Germany, and the “Jules C. Reiner Violin Prize” at Tanglewood. He was a top prize winner at the “Washington International Competition 2006”.

Since his solo debut at age 13 with the Bologna Symphony, Mr. Placci has appeared in solo performances with major symphony orchestras like the Barcelona Symphony, the Radio Television Orchestra of Spain (RTVE), the Baden-Baden Philarmonie, the Annapolis Symphony, the Bologna Symphony, Milan's Pomeriggi Musicali Orchestra, theTeatro San Carlo of Napoli Symphony, the Haydn Orchestra of Bolzano, the St. Petersburg State Academic Capella Orchestra, the Padova e del Veneto Orchestra, among others.

In September 2005, collaborating with conductor Uwe Mund and the RTVE Orchestra (Orchestra of the Radio-Television of Spain), Mr. Placci world premiered with great acclaim the Violin Concerto written by Catalan composer Jordi Cervelló. The concert was broadcasted live from Teatro Monumental in Madrid both on the radio and the national television (Tve2).

In 2007, Cervelló composed and dedicated to him his “Tre Pensieri” for violin and piano.

Mr. Placci is also an avid chamber musician, with performances that range from duo recitals in prominent concert seasons such as Musica Insieme and Accademia Filarmonica Mozart in Bologna, Società del Quartetto of Vicenza, Asolo Musica, Steinway Hall Boston, to trio appearances as a founding member of the Fortuna Piano Trio with K. Lee and M. Carbonara, which won the “Villecroze Academy Award 2007” in France, and toured South America (Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay).

Throughout the years Mr. Placci has been broadcast live on prominent radio stations such as the BBC Radio, the RTVE-Spain, the Bartok Radio-Hungary, WGBH Boston and RaiRadio in Italy.
In 2007 Mr. Placci has been appointed as Violin Faculty at The Boston Conservatory.

The son of two musicians, he makes his home between Bologna, Italy and Boston. He plays on a 1871 J.B. Vuillaume violin, copy of the “Alard” Stradivari.

Jessica Tong
Violin

Lauded for her "lyrical intensity" (Baltimore Sun) and her "performances to remember" (Woodstock Times), violinist Jessica Tong has garnered international acclaim as a soloist, recitalist and chamber musician. A recipient of the Canada Council Grant for Professional Musicians and the David Ouchterloney Award for Most Promising Young Artist, she is also a DAAD Scholar and has also been a top prizewinner at the Eckhardt-Gramatté Competition, the Toronto Symphony, Canadian Music and Yellow Springs International Chamber Music Competitions.

A devoted chamber musician, Ms Tong’s performances have taken her to Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, the Kennedy Center, les Invalides in Paris and the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, and led to collaborations with artists such as Pamela Frank, Leon Fleisher, Cho-Liang Lin and members of the Cleveland, Vogler, Brentano and Borromeo Quartets. She has served as the first violinist of the Vinca and Larchmere String Quartets, and most recently held the post of Artist-in-Residence at the University of Evansville and concertmaster of the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra in Indiana. Her debut album of chamber works by Stephan Krehl with the Larchmere Quartet and clarinetist Wonkak Kim was released in early 2016 by Naxos Records.

Dedicated to finding innovative ways to make the chamber music art form relevant and understood by current society, Ms Tong is also a passionate advocate for music education and humanizing the concert experience. She has been an Artist-in-Residence for the Perlman Music Program Suncoast in Florida, the Gorgeous Sounds Program in Oregon and a two time recipient of the ProQuartet Odyssee Residency Grant in France. She has served as a Co-Artistic Director for several chamber music workshops including Chamber Music of the Rockies in Colorado, University of Florida’s ChamberFest, and the Harlaxton Music Festival in England. She is a co-founder of the chamber music residency organization Music Beyond the Chamber, as well as the newly appointed Chamber Music Director for the Composers Conference and Chamber Music Workshop at Wellesley College in Massachusetts.

A pupil of Pamela Frank, Ms. Tong has also studied with Kathleen Winkler, Donald Weilerstein, and Zhang yun Zhang, and has been mentored as a chamber musician by members of the Alban Berg, Vogler, Artemis and Brentano Quartets.

Molly Carr
Viola

Violist Molly Carr, praised for her “ravishing sound” (The Strad) and her “passionate talent and beautiful poise” (AVS), was a top prizewinner in the 2008 Primrose International Viola Competition. As winner of the 2010 Juilliard Viola Concerto Competition, Ms. Carr made her New York Concerto debut with the Juilliard Orchestra under Xian Zhang in Alice Tully Hall. She is the recipient of major prizes and scholarships from the Davidson Institute, ASTA, ARTS, the Virtu Foundation, and the Julliard and Manhattan Schools of Music. An avid soloist, recitalist, and chamber musician, Ms. Carr has appeared across the U.S., as well as in Canada, Mexico, Europe, Israel and Asia. She is currently an artist of the Marlboro Music Festival and has performed at Ravinia’s Steans Institute, Music@Menlo, the International Musicians Seminar and Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove (UK), Malaga Clasica, Bari International Music Festival (Italy), Mozartfest (Wurzburg, Germany), Music from Angel Fire, Yellow Barn Music Festival, YAP Ottowa, and the Perlman Music Program.

Ms. Carr has collaborated with such renowned artists as Itzhak Perlman, Carter Brey, Peter Wiley, Ida Kavafian, Donald and Alisa Weilerstein, Pamela Frank, and the Orion and American Quartets, performing at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, Princeton’s McCarter Theatre, Chicago’s Symphony Center, and the Jerusalem Music Center. She is a member of the Solera Quartet, Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Notre Dame and Grand Prize Winner of the 2017 Pro Musicis International Award. As the first and only American chamber ensemble chosen for this award, the Solera Quartet will make its Carnegie Hall debut in Fall of 2018.

Ms. Carr recorded the Viola Sonata and early chamber works of Jennifer Hidgon on the NAXOS label with the Serafin Quartet; in 2018-2019, she will take part in a four-album recording project with Enescu Competition Grand Prize Winner, Josu de Solaun, recording the piano and string chamber music of George Enescu. In summer of 2018, her quartet, the Solera Quartet, will release its first studio album working with Grammy-winning producer Jesse Lewis. Additionally, the Carr-Petrova viola and piano duo will release its debut album entitled "Novel Voices" on the Centaur Label in 2019.

Highlights of Ms. Carr's 2017-2018 season include solo recitals and chamber music tours across the US, Spain, Canada, Germany, and Romania. A native of Reno, Nevada, Ms. Carr holds a B.M. and M.M. from the Juilliard School, having studied with Heidi Castleman, Steven Tenenbom, and Pinchas Zukerman. She is on the Viola Faculty of the Juilliard Precollege Division and is the Founding Director for Project: Music Heals Us, a nonprofit which brings the healing power of music to elderly, disabled, rehabilitating, incarcerated, and homeless populations.

Tobias Werner
Cello

Tobias was the cellist in residence and co-artistic director at Garth Newel Music Center from 1999 until 2012. He is the music director at The Chamber Music Conference of the East, artistic director of Pressenda Chamber Players, and is an Arts for the Aging (AFTA) teaching artist. He has performed at the Cape and Islands Chamber Music Festival, Villa Musica Mainz, the San Diego Chamber Music Workshop, the Vail Valley Bravo! Colorado Music Festival, the Maui Classical Music Festival, in Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, Strathmore Hall, the Phillips Collection, the Library of Congress, the National Gallery of Art, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the New York Society for Ethical Culture, and at Bargemusic.

Tobias has appeared as soloist with orchestras in the US, France, Germany, and Romania, and recent performances have included the concertos of Dvorák, Elgar, Haydn, and Boccherini. He has recorded on the ECM, Darbringhaus & Grimm, Bayer Records, and Orfeo labels. Recent CD releases include Piano Quartets by Mozart, Brahms, Dvorák, and Martinu with the Garth Newel Piano Quartet, the Suites for Unaccompanied Cello by J.S. Bach, and the Sonatas for Piano and Cello by Beethoven with Victor Asuncion. Tobias studied at the Musikhochschule Freiburg in Germany, and at Boston University.

His teachers have included Andrés Díaz, Christoph Henkel, and Xavier Gagnepain.
He plays on an 1844 J.F. Pressenda cello.

Tommy Thompson
Alexander Technique

Former Assistant Professor of Theater at Tufts University, Managing Director of Tufts Arena Theater, and co-founder of Alexander Technique International and ATI's first chair, for the past 40 years, Tommy Thompson has taught the Alexander Technique to professional and Olympic athletes, dressage riders, scientists, physicians, corporate and university professionals, musicians, dancers, actors, children and the disabled.

He has an active private teaching practice and has given close to 400 workshops for Alexander teachers, teacher trainees and the general public in the U.S.A., England, France, Ireland, Spain, Hungary, Canada, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Italy, Japan and Israel.

Tommy is founder and Director of the Alexander Technique Center at Cambridge, which has been training Alexander teachers since 1983. Tommy is also on the faculty at Harvard University where he teaches the Technique to graduate students enrolled in the Institute for Advanced Theater Training, Harvard University/Moscow Art Theater and the American Repertory Theater. Tommy also served as special assistant to the 1976 Olympic USA Heavyweight Rowing Crew.